People think I'm crazy. Okay, let's be honest, I am a bit crazy. Would I be matty if I wasn't? But that craziness isn't what I'm talking about. People think I am crazy because of my deep love and connection to sports. Sometimes it's brushed off as "oh boys," or being a typical jock/male. But, for me, this love and affinity for sports runs a lot deeper than that. It's about time people start to see and understand why.
The first thing one must come to understand is that sports, particularly baseball, were a huge part of the first 18-years of my life. It all started when I was little.
My brother is 8 years older than I am. I am not as close to him as I was when I was little for various reasons (though I still love him to death), but when I was younger he was my star. Yes he picked on me like any older brother and yes I annoyed the hell out of him like any little brother, but there was more. I looked up to him, especially in sports. My brother loved sports, but he especially loved baseball. He was a ballplayer, and he was good. Anytime he had a game, I was there. I'd be in the crowd. I'd come up to the dug out to give him snacks. After the game I would put on a helmet and run the bases. I fell in love with the game, and it was a connection for me to him.
My dad says he will never forget the day I first took the field for T-Ball. My face lit up, a smile that could rival the sun. I loved every moment, my dream had come true (even through my middle school years, the smile never left when I was on the field. Batters used to get creeped out by the pitcher who was grinning, enjoying every second of life on the field). While some kids had fun, this was the world to me. I remember running around the field playing every position because no one else on my teams seemed to be quite as into it as me. It was my love, my joy. I enjoyed to write, I enjoyed drawing and playing with blocks, but I LOVED baseball. In kindergarten I would always play ball with my friends at recess. When friends came over we would take turns pretending one person was the pitcher and one was the catcher as if it were a real life game. At my grandparents I used to practice all my favorite players stances as I played wiffle ball. Me and baseball went hand in hand.
As I grew older, it seemed to be the most common link between my brother and I. Neither of my siblings are Christians so I couldn't (or didn't know how) to talk to them about the Bible/my beliefs, and my brother is older than I am so I was too young to understand anything else he enjoyed. However, video games and sports I got. I would continue to watch his games, and he would come to mine (which was the second coolest thing behind playing). I would throw the ball against the porch like he did, trying to throw harder than him. I would always try to be better than he was. I could talk baseball with him, even from a young age, because I watched it and understood it. It was a bond between brothers. I never had a girlfriend so we didn't talk girls, I was too young to talk politics, and too young to talk about my beliefs...I think my view on what life is about was always different than his. Baseball was a mutual love.
Now the older I grew, the more I kept things bottled up inside. My siblings fought a lot (though looking back, probably not that much more than any other teenage siblings two years apart), so I felt I had to be perfect to make up for their arguing. If something was ever wrong, I didn't want to tell anyone because then my parents would have three kids with issues (all kids have issues, but I didn't understand this back then). I also put an enormous pressure on myself to excel and be "perfect." To add to this, I haven't been the closest to my parents. It's not all on them or all on me, it's just the way things have happened. So, I kept things inside. I didn't tell others what was going on either. For a long time (even some to this day) I have wrestled with self-esteem and a lot of self-doubt. The Devil has always been good at convincing me people don't really care about me, it's just them responding out of obligation for my asking them how they are doing. It took a lot for me to tell people what was up, I had to save face and they had to show they really cared.
In the midst of all this....I turned to baseball. Sports became my sanctuary. When I was on the field, everything was okay. I lost myself in the routine, in the rituals and superstition. I lost myself in the grass, in the dirt, to the feel of the bat, to the sound of popping gloves. When I was there, everything else was okay. I had a team who cared about me (or at least me playing), and I had something that I was good at, and people affirmed I was good.
I found a lot of my worth, my identity in sports. I was Matt, the baseball player. Baseball was everything. My ability in baseball was going to get me into college, determine which one I went to, and pay for it. My ability was going to become my career/profession. By making it my career/profession, it would be a platform to set myself apart, to not live the luxurious life of a ball-player but to live humbly, spending little and giving a lot. I imagined myself living in rough neighborhoods and giving all the extra money to charity, to truly make a difference in the community and in peoples lives other than simply offering entertainment. It was going to be a platform for me to Glorify God, to change lives. I saw it as a platform for racial reconciliation, as a platform to show my ideas and beliefs, as a platform for people to ask "why is he different," and then to profess who Jesus is. It was a platform to help create change. Sports were going to be my ticket to a wife, as it would help me be in shape and ripped (haha that didn't happen) so I'd be physically attractive, I'd be in the spotlight so I'd gain attention, but then she would see and hear the soft-side as well. It was my everything.
A lot of hard times came, especially in high school, but sports were consistent, I always had my sanctuary. This made my injuries that much more devastating. Missing the playoffs freshman year because of my shoulder, missing them sophomore year because doctors thought I had one of the rare heart-conditions which first symptom is death (luckily I didn't), missing ALL of Junior year and my shot to be recruited because of my shoulder surgery, and missing playoffs senior year because we didn't make em.
Was I good enough to play in college or pro, I don't know. I think in my head I lied to myself and told myself I was a lot better than I was. My freshman year, my coach said if I continued at the rate I was and worked hard, I could probably play Division I, in fact I was one of the few players to go through my school while he was there that had a real chance. My brother thought so too. I look back and wonder if things had happened differently, if I had played winter and fall ball, if I had played for different leagues that could help get me recruited, if I had gone to hitting coaches, or had surgery freshman year and played all of sophomore-senior year, if things would be different. Would I still be playing. A lot of me is thankful for the opportunities I have had outside of baseball, that had I played winter and fall ball or was playing to this day I may have missed. But a piece of me still misses it. The game, the teams, everything it meant to me, the platform it was....I miss it deep inside.
I still find that sports have a special place in my heart. I experience things through them in a lot of ways. Stories can give me goosebumps, get me teary eyed, sentimental etc. But when it's a similar story in sports....it tugs my hearts strings. Invictus, a story of racial reconciliation through sports....chilled me to the bone. Stories about overcoming adversity to make it to the level of the game people are at now....makes me wobbly in the knees. Love stories, sad stories, happy stories, etc. that happen in sports or in the world of sports or using sports just trigger something special. I see sports as being so much bigger and more powerful than the game itself....and as being a platform and arena for bigger more important and incredible things. They are special.
I understand it is not this way for everyone. I love writing and reading poetry. For some people it is music (although music is huge for me too I'm just not good at it). For some it may be art, or theater, or science etc etc. But for me....sports is...it's something more.
I'm sure there are more things I haven't thought of or didn't mention....or haven't even realized yet. And I am sure I sound absolutely CRAZY, but it is me. I sometimes think/wonder if this is why I was injured and no longer play. I clung to it more than God, it was my refuge more than He was. Yes....God gives us things to go to in hard times, but ultimately do we cling to those or to Him? In an odd way....sports were almost a drug, a therapy, and He wants me to cling to Him not them.
I still can't help but wonder if there is a reason I love them so deeply....and feel so linked to them. Maybe this will play out in my future, my career. Maybe I'll be involved in some kind of sports ministry, or coach inner-city baseball for youth on the South Side of Chicago, who knows. Regardless, there will always be a special place in my heart for them.
Call me crazy, it won't be the first time and won't be last. Disagree, think I've lost it, and say "they're just a game...." but to me they are more. To me, the power of sports while on the field, far outreach the confines of the grass, the wood, the stands, and those few hours spent playing. To me....sports speak to the heart in a unique way...a venue for God to do His thing, a vessel for His divine power. Call me crazy....go ahead...that's what makes me matty :)